Dragon Quest 3 was first released in Japan in February 1988, to a world not only changed by its predecessors, but by its competitors as well. The first installments of fellow JRPG juggernauts Phantasy Star and Final Fantasy had come out within days of each other in December 1987, and Yuji Horii's brainchild was no longer the only game in town. And it took until March 1992 for Dragon Warrior 3 to see distribution in North America, two years after FF and almost four years after PS.

But it was worth the wait. Whereas DW1 had sacrificed depth for accessibility, and DW2 was shackled to a poorly balanced and often downright cruel endgame, DW3 either perfects the series' formula or comes damn close to it, depending on who you ask. An especially harsh critic might call it "the first good one"; I wouldn't go so far myself, but it's definitely the best one yet by a considerable margin. Every aspect is refined and taken at least a step further: it looks better, it sounds better, and it definitely plays better from beginning to end. There's a bit of mechanical jank behind the scenes, with some of the stats doing surprisingly little for you, and certain supposedly beneficial items being actually quite harmful, but by and large it's solidly put together.

Probably the greatest point of innovation for the series is the customizable party system. Not only do we have access to an entire party of four (four!) characters nearly from the start, but we even get to decide the class and gender of those characters, with several types of melee fighters and spellcasters to choose from. That said, none of them are descendants of Erdrick.

: Wait, what? Why the heck are we here, then?: It's not so bad. We don't have to be related to every hero out there.: If it's going to be an epic tale of daring adventure, I'm on board either way!: Besides, I'm just about done seeing our family having to climb its way out of tragedy.: Not that we'd wish a terrible fate upon anyone else, but...: Eh, okay, sure, fair enough.

For being 84 pages long, the manual is light on story; everything we need to know, the game will tell us in time.

Oh, and in case you're jumping in with us for the first time, I've just done series for Dragon Warrior 1 and Dragon Warrior 2. You don't strictly need to have gone through them to follow along here, but for reasons that I can't divulge at this time I highly recommend that you do. I'll also have the protagonists for these games providing regular color commentary, and it might be good to know what's going on in these chuckleheads' backstory.

Iiiii probably don't need to set a strict spoiler policy here, but just in case, let's keep it to what we've seen yet. I'm not going into this blind, but maybe someone is, and Rubiss knows there are some neat reveals in here!

Surprise! Dragon Warrior 3 follows the lead of Zelda 2, and is now a side-scrolling slash-em-up!

Okay, maybe not.

What a cool battle scene, though! The lightning illumination is rad, and then you've got the dragon feinting a dive with the warrior crouching, getting up for an instant, and then crouching again when he sees the beast following through, and he's being overly careful about the fire breath because he's unsure of its range, and and and... dang, and everything! And the spritework is great too. It's just, wow.

Of course it's nothing like the rest of the game, but it's still a lavish way to start.

This entire intro sequence is new for the North American version. The original Japanese version is rather minimalistic by any measure. It starts with...

...and goes right to the file selection menu. Dragon Quest was a heck of a brand already by then, it didn't need much else.

We've a got new main menu tune again this time, but the Japanese version had no music whatsoever here. In fact, Dragon Quest IV had already been released by the time Dragon Warrior III was localized for North America, so the menu music here is actually DQ4's menu music. How's that for weird?

Ah, of course. Lessee...

Aaaand that's right! You can now choose between a male and female protagonist! At this point we've had three gentlemen and only the one lady, so let's balance the scales a bit this time.

There are vanishingly few differences between genders in this version of the game. A small handful of equipment is only available to women, and I think it makes a minor difference in a couple events, but stat growth is identical. Even the hero's sprite is exactly the same, and in a bizarre oversight, basically everyone still refers to us as male.

So, we're sixteen, and the game starts with our mom waking us up. Is it really a cliché if it's the first time it ever happens?

: I appreciate this idea of going to bed in full combat gear. It shows commitment to the adventuring lifestyle.

: Mom, I'm already awake, there's no need to get in my face!: You're saying that as if I hadn't spent the entire night stressing out about it.: ...a lad? You're clearly even more stressed out about it than I am.

Get ready for a lot of people around the world talking to us like we're a dude. I knew the game didn't always get it right but I dared hope our own mother wouldn't make that mistake.

The Command menu is identical to how it was in DW2. The Talk option still ought to be just be pressing the B button once, but it's not, whatchagonnado.

The Status option has a few sub-options now. Formation would allow us to change our marching order if we had more than one party member.

The info window that appears when we stand still only shows our current HP and MP, so we can use the Condition option to get a quick look at everyone's maximum values as well without opening up the whole standard status menu four times.

The Info option reveals a few new notions of interest!

Strength and Agility largely function as they always have, with Attack Power being your weapon bonus plus your Strength, and Defense Power being your defensive gear's bonus plus half your Agility. However, Agility now massively influences the order in which combat turns are taken. Every round, every participant rolls a number between 25% and 100% of their Agility, and they take their actions from the highest result to the lowest.

Agility still doesn't influence evasion rate. All human party members have a 4 out of 256 chance to dodge incoming standard attacks. Monsters each have their own evasion stat; most have 0 or 4, but some have up to 28.

Vitality is weird in that it doesn't do anything by itself. The amount of Vitality you earn from a level up determines how much HP that level will earn you: the HP you gain in a level is equal to twice your Vitality gain for that level, plus a random number from -2 to 2. But having a high Vitality number on your status screen confers no particular advantage.

Intelligence is mostly the same as Vitality, as it governs MP growth in the same way and also confers no advantage by itself. Or, almost no advantage: a character with high Intelligence tends to learn certain spells earlier than a character with low Intelligence.

Luck is used solely to resist status ailments, whether from spells or special breath attacks.

We're starting with a Copper Sword and Leather Armor, which is what the Prince of Midenhall had. Either Midenhall was poor, or Zofia's family is wealthy!

: Considering she has her own bed, I'd say she's living in decadent luxury.

The graphics are already showing signs of improvement here. We're on the second floor so the floor is made of wood instead of stone, the staircase has handrails, there's an actual table that's not a repurposed pillar, a chair instead of a stool, a dresser, and a bed that's not just two white squares. Amazing!

As soon as we get close to our mother, she literally starts dragging us through town.

: I know where the castle is, mom.: Considering everything dad did for him, he probably should remember his manners in front of me.

If we try to return to town...

: So, no time for a quick breakfast then? Fine. Make me meet royalty on an empty stomach, no problem.

We've sure come a long way from the Tantegel throne room's thirty second loop.

: Well, that's fancy. No one's even trying to supervise me, so how about I take just a quick look around? It's not like the king will have the gall to kick me out.

Locked doors already! Better start taking notes.

: I'm... not sure what you expect me to do with that information.

: I suppose it's good to see you're proud about doing your job.

: The princess is missing!? Oh wow, suddenly I feel like I know why I'm here.

: Oh, uh. Found her.

: Ah, right, the... the Archfiend. I wonder what poor sap the king is going to put in charge of this nonsense.

The guy on the left politely stays in front of the bars, but the one on the right is wandering randomly. That won't take like a million minutes, right?

: He stole a key from me, Bakor!: Are you sure he didn't just recover it from you after you stole it from him first?

: There's a tunnel leading out of the jail? That's just asking for trouble.

And that's the first floor. We're out of ways to procrastinate, better head on up.

: Oh, yes, I'm sure he's the anxious one here.

: That way, even if you rest from your journeys for a while, you can restore your status.

Which means kings still get to save our game. You'd think they'd have a scribe for that or something.

: Well that's a reasonable notion to put on a sixteen year old's shoulders.

: That doesn't matter. Everyone knows that night only happens when you're good and ready to go to sleep.

: Pay attention to the formation.

Here we continue the tradition of guards in the first castle explicitly introducing gameplay mechanics to you. In DW2, Zed, Glynn and Gwen had equal chances of being targeted by any given single-target attack (with a few exceptions), but here, it makes a massive difference who you have where.

In most circumstances, the character in front is targeted 44% of the time, the one in second place 40%, the one in third 15%, and the last one literally 1%. However, certain enemies have an AI that ignores marching order and chooses targets as though everyone had equal chance to be picked, and of course group-hitting attacks always hit everyone.

: It's best to go to Luisa's Place at the west edge of town and find some companions.

It's possible to beat the game alone, but I wouldn't recommend it!

As soon as we reach the king, he starts speaking to us immediately.

: Um... Your... Uh... Your Majesty? I... Uh... Can't you see...? I mean... Who told you that-: It is said that thy father Ortega met his end when he fell into a volcano's crater at the end of a battle.: Um. Yes, I... Thanks for reminding me of how my father died. That's very delicate of you.

: Holy shit, kings are dicks.: Ahem.: Present company excluded.: Legendary hero as you are, I cannot stand silent while you sully my father's me-: Good grief, okay, on average kings tend to be dicks at a higher rate than the rest of the population.

: We do hereby accept your petition to follow in the footsteps of your brave father.

: Hopefully not straight into a volcano.: ZEDPOWER!: You have to admit that's exceptionally poor wording.

: Thy enemy shall be the Archfiend Baramos.: Wait, what? I'm barely sixteen, I thought you'd send me against some brigands or-: The name of the Archfiend Baramos is yet unknown in the world of men. If things remain unchanged, before long the world will be destroyed by the Archfiend. Baramos must be defeated!: Yes I agree but-: Seek companions at the local eatery and start your quest.

: "His party?": She's a bit of a tomboy, but come on!

: Th-thank you, Your Highness, that is very gene-: Farewell! Until we meet once more, Zofia!

: Does he think Zofia is a common name for teenage boys?: Well, he's progressive, if not especially perceptive.

Just like that, we're pointed at this Archfiend Baramos and cut loose. At least we got some money, right?

: And I thought Lorik was a cheap bastard!

: If nobody's heard about this Baramos, I wonder how the king expects me to even find him. But he must have learned about him somewhere. Maybe someone in town can help me out.

: Well, the king's worried enough about it to send a teenage girl after him. With... 50 gold. Huh.

Oooh, that looks like a House of Healing.

: But I hear there are bigger continents beyond the sea.

Yup, that's a House of Healing alright. All services have a cost that is dependant on the ailing character's level, with poison removal being the cheapest and curse removal being the most expensive.

In the Japanese version...

...the Houses of Healing were still obviously churches.

Tree tiles used to be passable in DW2, but that's no longer the case here. It did look pretty weird.

: No you won't.: That does sound pretty crazy. Night isn't something you reach by walking.: Maybe "the edge of night" is a place. Like a dance hall or a tavern or something.

: Well... I haven't really looked at it specifically in a while.: You should see it as soon as you go outside.: I've lived here all my life, I know where it is.: That which you see rising up on that island is the Tower of Najima.

: Daughter. I'm his daughter. Good grief.: Who's this Ortega, by the way? It's almost like everyone's talking about him like the folk of our time talked about Erdrick.: Can't say I've ever heard the name.: I suppose we'll find out.

We've seen most of this before. The Bamboo Stick is now a Cypress Stick, and the Wayfarer's Clothes offers 4 more points of defense than the regular Clothes; it's basically a good upgrade for wizardy types who can't wear Leather Armor. But the only thing we want is the Leather Shield, and we can't even afford it yet.

: I live next door. You see me walk by everyday when I go training.: Farewell. Do come again.

Nothing for us up here.

It's a pretty standard item shop, though the price of Wings has gone way down between games, from 70 to 25. We hold off on buying anything for now.

: Then came a war in which many lost their lives. At that time the Travel Door connecting across the ocean was closed off.: If I ever have to go that way, I sure hope I won't be executed on sight as soon as I get to the other side.

: If you go north, you'll come to the village of Reeve.

: Hi Grandpa! I'm back from the castle!: Yes, that's usually how it works.

: The audience went about as well as we expected. So... Yeah, I'll be leaving soon.: Wait, what? My day's barely even sta-

Aaaaand we rest. Our home is a free inn.

: Well that's a lucky young lady right there.

: You're certainly looking cheerful about it.: Yes, of course I'm going. I'm just a bit surprised that you're, um, taking it so well.: Right! I'll be on my way, then. It's not like I haven't been looking forward to this day for a long time!

Well hey, this sure is better than sneaking out in the middle of the night and leaving our family in tears.

: There's Luisa's Place. It's empty most of the time, but I ought to try my luck anyway.

: Ah, right. I'm sure you're holding something for me.: I think it's about time I got the money my father kept here.: I'm Ortega's daughter. He fell in a volcano. I'm sixteen. Hand me the stash.: I'm sorry, there's not a sausage.: ...: This happens all the time, you know. My condolences.: Oh, dad.

A much needed addition to the series' repertoire of businesses, the Vault allows you to store items and gold. Gold is only stored in increments of a thousand, so we won't be using that facility for a while. And leaving items is free, but you need to pay 10% of the item's worth to get it back. For quest items and assorted plot coupons that tends to be extremely cheap, but stashing good gear can get expensive.

: I do what I want!

: This is the eatery where people gather, meet or part with companions.: So, who's around today?

Doing anything at Luisa's Place requires us to allow Luisa to save our game at every step. I'm not entirely sure why that is, but maybe it's there to prevent some exploit or another.

These three are the default "recommended" party, but... that's boring.

: So, we've got Brindar, the Sold-: Actual dumbass. I wouldn't trust him to know which end of the sword goes in the Slime.: Mathias the Wiz-: Glug glug, no thanks.: There's also Petrus the P-: Isn't he kind of a jerk?: Yes, well, maybe, but I'm sure once you get to know him-: Hard pass.: You're being very difficult. : I agree, it's difficult to like any of the choices you've got for me.: Well, we've got people coming in and out all the time.: You and I both know that's not true.: Look, I have a business to run, and times are tough for travelers. You can take these three stooges off my hands, you can wait for someone else to show up, or you can get out of my hair.: Ugh. Fine. I'll be upstairs, keeping an eye on the nonexistent traffic to this business you claim to run.

: If you want to take one along, wait until you get strong and take one along just for laughs.

: Clearly the odds of a sage wandering into this dump are rather low.

Ah, it's always good to see a NES game with enough attention to detail to clearly depict the butthole on a cat.

We actually get to create and name our party members here. They get added to Luisa's list downstairs, and we can recruit them from there.

So! What three lucky randos will be walking in the doors to Luisa's place and be blessed with the opportunity to accompany the daughter of the legendary hero Ortega on her royal quest to defeat vile Archfiend Baramos?

Okay, we can't actually recruit Heroes. Ortega probably was one, but Zofia might well be the only one in the world at this point.

Heroes have a lot in common with the protagonist of Dragon Warrior 1, in that they're accomplished melee combatants with a wide variety of spells at their disposal, from direct damage to healing to utility, with some extremely powerful magic exclusive to them. They also have access to almost all of the best equipment available.

In terms of game design, the Hero is the linchpin of DW3's party system: you can bring along literally any half-brained combination of other characters and still have one adventurer on your side who is highly competent at everything. That said, their stats are high, but not the highest in any category, and they tend to have much less MP than any other spellcasting class. If your Hero is your only healer, you might need to budget for a ton of Medical Herbs.

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Soldiers

Mightily armed and armored, Soldiers are a party's reliable and sturdy backbone. They have most in common with DW2's Prince of Midenhall, with high Strength (better than the Hero's), extremely high HP, and the ability to equip the heaviest gear.

They pay for their martial skill with the lowest Agility growth (making them very often act last in combat) and a complete lack of spellcasting prowess. They also tend to be very expensive to outfit!

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Fighters

Impossibly strong and nimble, Fighters are skilled martial artists entering the field of battle with only the lightest equipment. They have the highest Strength and Agility scores of all by a considerable margin, and a decent amount of HP to their name (slightly less than the Hero).

They also have a hidden benefit, in that their critical hit chance goes up as they gain levels. All other classes have a 1 in 64 chance to roll a crit every time they use a standard attack, but Fighters have odds equal to their level out of 256 instead.

However, they also cannot cast spells, and their gear choices are extremely limited. They can wear only the lightest of armor, and most weapons they can equip actually reduce their attack power. This does make them cheap to outfit, but you don't see them gain a lot of power all at once as you progress to new areas with new shops with cool gear for sale.

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Wizards

Wizards are offensive spellcasters, specializing in powerful direct damage but also obtaining a wide variety of support magic, including several very useful non-combat utility spells. They have a lot of in common with the Princess of Moonbrooke, but with none of her healing talent. They have high Intelligence and MP of course, but also the second highest Agility scores, somewhat compensating for their inability to use most equipment and often allowing them to cast their spells very early in each combat turn.

They also have the lowest HP and Strength scores, making them fairly brittle and exceptionally poor hand-to-hand combatants besides.

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Pilgrims

More akin to Dungeons & Dragons clerics than Final Fantasy white mages, Pilgrims are spellcasters specializing in healing and support magic, but with a touch of martial ability on the side. They're no replacements for Soldiers or Fighters, but an average Strength and decent choice of gear makes them more than able to carry their weight in melee combat. They have a lot in common with the Prince of Cannock in that way, even retaining some of his direct damage magic ability (though their damage spells are weaker than Wizards') and his instant death incantations.

In terms of stats, they have about as much Agility as the Hero, but are much weaker and a fair deal less robust. However, their Intelligence and MP are on par with Wizards, and they're well able to fulfill an entire party's healing needs.

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Merchants

Merchants are most remarkable for their knack for finding extra gold. At the end of every battle in which at least one Merchant is present, you have a 25% chance to find extra money, equal to 1 plus 1/8th of the amount the monsters would have normally dropped. (Neither the chance nor the amount stack, regardless of how many Merchants you bring along.) They also have a special command to Appraise any item in their inventory, allowing you to learn its market value, whether it is cursed or not, and whether it has a special combat use or not.

When it comes to battle, Merchants are strictly middle of the road melee combatants with no magical ability. They're between the Hero and Pilgrim in terms of fighting prowess, with decent HP and a fairly good equipment selection, including a few pieces of kit that only they can wear.

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Goof-offs

As the ruffian in Luisa's Place mentioned, Goof-offs are largely useless. Apart from their exceptionally high Luck, they have awful stats across the board, with the lowest possible HP growth, Strength on par with Wizards, and the second worst Agility growth. They have no magical ability, and their choice of equipment is ridiculously bad.

If that wasn't terrible enough, every combat turn has a 25% chance of having them perform random, questionably amusing antics instead of doing what you told them to do. In fact, they have 34 quasi-comical ways to waste their time, and they learn each of them as they level up in much the same manner as spellcasters learn their spells. Most of them do absolutely nothing, one of them causes them to Parry and reduce incoming damage, and another has a small chance to inflict them with the Numb status (a lasting paralysis effect).

However, Goof-offs have a SeCrEt MyStErIoUs PoWeR!!!! within them that takes a great deal of time and effort to reveal. Whether that's worth taking one along instead of a party member who will obey your commands and actually be effective at what you ask them to do, well, that's up to you, I suppose.

Oh, and yes indeed, one of them is an actual clown, and the other is a bunny-girl in heels, perpetually holding a bottle. Hmm-mmm.

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We've also heard about Sages, but they are far beyond our reach at this time. Aaaand that'll be all of them.

So!

This is how it's going to work. Dear readers, I'm going to ask each of you to choose three classes, representing the three party members Zofia will take along on her quest. And by "three classes", I mean "three classes". Any entry with fewer (or more) than three choices or any permutation of duplicate choices will be completely disqualified and disregarded. The order you put them in doesn't matter, I'll give equal weight to each selection.

I am confident I can make anything you lot put on my shoulders work (even a Goof-off!), but I won't use more than one character of each class because I want to get to show off as many classes in our main party as the game will let me. (We can swap out party members at any time, so I might put together a B team with the classes we don't use at some point just for fun, especially if the A team is missing any of the spellcasters, but I'm not going to promise it.) And if that wasn't clear, don't vote for a Hero either, we couldn't get another even if we wanted to.

I also reserve the right to pick the gender of every character. I'm going to be writing a heck of a lot for these doofuses, so I want to make sure I'm feeling the party dynamic.

That should be everything. Obviously I don't have a backlog of gameplay ready to go, so I'll be leaving votes open for a few days, and then I'll get started putting an update together afterwards.

Nakamura: Yeah. You yourself didn’t even have time to play the game all the way through!

Horii: I had to write the scenario and adjust the game balance at the same time, so I was very busy. I too played up until you get the boat many times, but there was absolutely no time for me to thoroughly play the latter half of the game… from the boat to Rhone, the content is a bit thin.

Nakamura: It wasn’t just you and me either. On the day the final version was ready to be taken in for production, I was shocked to learn that not a single person on the development had played the game all the way through. I was horrified! How were we supposed to release a game in this state? Thankfully, for Dragon Quest III we’ve resolved this problem; the game has been completely balanced and tested from start to finish.

The game has been playtested, so it's already sounding like a step up.

Also, let me say this: As a hardcore Soldier user, and a first time Fighter user on my current playthrough, I am now 100% convinced that Fighters are just as good if not better than Soldiers until the very endgame when the really good gear is available. (And of course, there's a solution for that.)

The reason is, despite having less HP, fighters start to get MASSIVE STR/AGI gains between 20-30 and their huge agility (plus a certain cloak they can wear) puts them on par with a Soldier defensively. Oh, and if you really have trouble, there's even another certain item they can take advantage of with their massive AGI to boost their DEF even more.

In any case, Soldiers going last every. single. time. really makes you take a lot of extra hits, and Fighters going first almost all the time really cuts down on how many attacks the enemy team gets. I'm not saying Soldiers are bad, mind you, but even with their super poor equipment selection, Fighters are the real deal. Plus, they save you a ton of money. And the extra crits are just a nice cherry on top. I don't think you can roll crits against bosses? but even so.

My vote's a party of Fighter, Merchant, Pilgrim. Sage the Merchant soon as you can. All women, girl team is underrepresented in this series and just more fun, and if you get lucky with rare drops actually to your advantage. And the sprites all look better.

Merchants have fantastic physical stat growth early game, which peters off conveniently right around the time class changes become available. But up until then, gear- and stat-wise, they're basically Soldiers but better. Having no casting hurts their MP early when you switch to a casting class, but since their Int always kinda sucked - and Int only determines MP gains - you'll catch up real fast.

Fighters do terrifying damage, especially with their huge crit chance - it's 4/256 for everyone else, but 4/256 and another level/256 roll for Fighters. Defense is astonishingly good despite awful armor choice, especially with the item Friday mentioned. You can crit bosses just fine, the only weird thing is that Bikill doesn't work when you crit.

Pilgrim's a no-brainer. You want more healing than Zofia can provide, and the Infernos line will cover your group offense.

Wizards are honestly overrated. Physical damage is so much more reliable than magical damage in 90% of situations, and the rare occasions when it isn't, Zofia can pick up the slack. Wizards are mostly good for their buffs, like Bikill and Increase, in the very late game, and a Sage can cover that by the time it matters.

This is the group I went with when I played it during the DW1 Let's Play. It sounds weird, but it's astonishingly capable. Up until the class change, you've got three powerhouse physical hitters and a support caster, and after, you've still got all that but you've upgraded to two full support casters. You save a ton of gold not having to gear out a Soldier all game. All you're really giving up is some magical offense early on that just misses half the time anyway.

edit: i guess you also miss the option to farm bomb crags with the poison needle early on. c'est la guerre. that's cheaty anyway.

Wizards are indeed pretty damn weak (and almost completely untenable lategame with everything spamming AoE spells and breath) but they're pretty useful in the mid-game, when their spells hit hard and enemies haven't yet developed high chances to evade spells. Also going Wizard -> Pilgrim and whatever -> Sage gives you double Bikill. (and also basically double Sage.) Also CUTE WITCH GIRL THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT PART

But yeah, you can get by just fine without one. They're incredibly weak and if they get "targeted" by those fucking Anteaters or any other enemy that does that shit, they go down in one round.

Party selection is mostly about taking a Pilgrim. After that, whatever is fine.

I'm definitely not taking along dudewizard because the personality I'd want to give him would probably end up overlapping with Brey's get-off-my-lawn-i'm-too-old-for-this-shit deal. Also, CUTE WITCH GIRL indeed.

The SA goons' comments have been indirectly been giving me the idea to have occasional interlude episodes featuring a three character B team following in the main party's footsteps (with the classes we're not using and the hero "killed off"), and though that sounds like a lot of extra work, the more I think about it the more I like the notion. I think the game's fun enough to support it, in any case, so it's tempting.

nosimpleway wrote:As much as money-grinding is a thing in DW, a quarter of an eighth of the dosh you get from fights doesn't seem significant enough to matter much.

It adds up, but yeah, it can end up being mostly just a consumables budget. Packing your Merchant with Medical Herbs until they burst at the seams feels a lot better when you know they're basically paying for it themselves.

Since Thief is only available in the SNES/GBC versions, I'll go Fighter, Pilgrim, Wizard. I'm very tempted to echo TA and swap the Wizard for Merchant since the extra money is nice and eventually they're both Sages anyway, but since whips and boomerangs are also SNES/GBC-only, it's really nice to have a little more multi-target power for random encounters.

I like the idea of Fighter/Merchant/Pilgrim to start, though I'd say you'd want your final party to be Soldier/Fighter/Sage. Bikill is great, but a lot of the final bosses dispel it. IIRC Fighter was easily the MVP of those last fights because they all have huge defense her crits ate through like butter, and there's just too much great gear to not have a Soldier around. You can make your initial Fighter a Soldier to compensate for the poor AGI growth, move your Merchant to Sage, and make the Pilgrim your other Fighter to keep some OOC spot-healing around late game.

I think I'm gonna give it a few more hours and then I'll get started. The struggle for third place is more highly contested than I anticipated!

Class changing could get complicated if I want to keep things democratic and make sure it doesn't end up like "these are the classes you wanted me to use but I'mma change them into something else lol", but we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.

Aaaaand I know name recommendations are traditional for that sort of thing but I would feel reaaaaaaally weird writing dialog for characters named after people I know. :3